Many children on the spectrum have problems following the lead of others and are frequently viewed asoppositional. This is usually seen as intentional, and noncompliance and the child is then labeled with oppositional defiant disorder (ODD) which is not necessarily true. These children must control activities and interaction and refuse to follow the lead of others. If we put pressure on them, they often act out to re-establish control. This occurs because of various reasons like sensory difficulties, delayed processing, auditory processing difficulties, becoming overwhelmed, difficulty understanding what is expected of them, strong performance anxiety or sometimes even lack of motivation to name just a few. Many children on the spectrum only feel safe once they are in control of the things, they are engaging in. Uncertainty usually activates the freeze, fight, or flight responses, so to avoid this they feel the need to control. Some tips on how to help: Respect and accommodate for sensory sensitivities and use a sensory diet to calm and organize the nervous system. Break tasks down to smaller or more manageable sizes. Pick your battles, understand their strengths and weaknesses and work collaboratively; keep language short and clear, give them time to respond, watch them
being good and provide praise, think out loud and provide narrative of what is needed to do, ease transitioning by providing information of what is next to come; teach coping skills for dealing with overload.
#Oppositionaldefiancedisorder
#ODD #ASDControl
#Fightflightfreezeresponses
#ASD
#feelingsafeandincontrol